compact communities

Organization

Year Initiated

Description

Mountain View has a rapidly revitalizing downtown and continues to successfully intensify land use around its transit facilities – providing much needed housing in a very tight Silicon Valley market. One of the key tools used in this process is precise planning. Precise plans serve as comprehensive planning/zoning documents that can be used to realize smart growth principles. Mountain View has established precise plans for defined geographic areas within the city. The plans contain comprehensive zoning and design guidelines for the entire area that replace its original zoning. Precise plans have similar requirements for public involvement to zoning changes, which means they are discussed in both planning commission and city council public meetings. Additional meetings with local residents sometimes take place, depending on the level of controversy for an individual project. The city’s General Plan provides for several principles of smart growth, including encouraging denser development near transit stops. Precise planning has made smart growth planning easier, but does not always lead to smart growth; this is because precise plans are tied to community goals, which may not always be consistent with smart growth principles.

Results:

• Precise planning led to development of The Crossings, an 18-acre transit-oriented mixed-use development adjacent to a CalTrain commuter rail station. This dense, walkable development, which includes 358 housing units, replaced a failing shopping center and other uses that were causing a decline in neighborhood vitality. The development was enabled by the San Antonio Center Precise Plan, written cooperatively by the City of Mountain View and the developer, TPG Development. As the planning process was carried out, both the city and TPG had to compromise some of their views on how the final development should appear. The Crossings represents the potential for results from Mountain View’s precise planning process, which guided the city and the developer to fulfill goals set out in the city’s General Plan.
• Other precise planning projects near rail transit stations include the Whisman Station Plan for 525 housing units adjacent to a new light rail station and the Downtown Station Plan allowing a variety of uses and development densities within walking distance of the regional commuter rail station and light rail stop.

Vital Statistics:

• Compact development policies were adopted by Mountain View and other towns in Santa Clara County in the early 1970s.
• Mountain View General Plan policies (adopted in 1992) encourage smart growth.
• Project-specific precise plans are built on principles that are derived from General Plan policies.
• Once a precise plan is in place, it constitutes the zoning for the area covered, and the development must comply with it.

Key Player(s)

Contact Info

References

• City of Mountain View, “San Antonio Center Precise Plan,” 1992.
• City of Mountain View, “General Plan,” 1992.